Design patterns are a format for capturing and sharing design knowledge. In this paper, we look at a new domain for design patterns, namely ubiquitous computing. The overall goal of this work is to aid practice by speeding up the diffusion of new interaction techniques and evaluation results from researchers, presenting the information in a form more usable to practicing designers. Towards this end, we have developed an initial and emerging pattern language for ubiquitous computing, consisting of 45 pre-patterns describing application genres, physical-virtual spaces, interaction and systems techniques for managing privacy, and techniques for fluid interactions. We evaluated the effectiveness of our pre-patterns with 16 pairs of designers in helping them design location-enhanced applications. We observed that our pre-patterns helped new and experienced designers unfamiliar with ubiquitous computing in generating and communicating ideas, and in avoiding design problems early in the design process.

Our findings suggest that the ability to adapt indoor wayfinding devices for specific users' preferences and needs will be particularly important.

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Assistive technology for wayfinding will significantly improve the quality of life for many individuals with cognitive impairments. The user interface of such a system is as crucial as the underlying implementation and localization technology. We built a system using the Wizard-of-Oz technique that let us experiment with many guidance strategies and interface modalities. Through user studies, we evaluated various configurations of the user interface for accuracy of route completion, time to completion, and user preferences. We used a counter-balanced design that included different modalities (images, audio, and text) and different routes. We found that although users were able to use all types of modalities to find their way indoors, they varied significantly in their preferred modalities. We also found that timing of directions requires careful attention, as does providing users with confirmation messages at appropriate times. Our findings suggest that the ability to adapt indoor wayfinding devices for specific users' preferences and needs will be particularly important.